


You Make Me Want To Make Music Again

by misura



Category: American Idol RPF
Genre: Community: Harlequinkradam, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-29
Updated: 2010-09-29
Packaged: 2017-11-01 23:46:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/362631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misura/pseuds/misura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wherein Kris wants to make a comeback and Adam wants Kris.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Make Me Want To Make Music Again

**Author's Note:**

> prompt: _8\. Kris Allen has realized that he made a mistake when he left his music career behind. Now he's mounting a comeback, and opening for Adam Lambert during his summer concert tour would be a coup, but there's a catch: Adam wants Kris as more than his opening act._

When they tell Adam he's got a call from Kris, he comes _this_ close to asking: _'Kris who?'_.

After that, he considers saying something like: _'I don't want to talk to him'_ except that that would make him sound like a jerk and okay, so maybe Adam can be a bit of a jerk sometimes; he's only human after all, and some people just seem to insist on finding his buttons and then jumping on them with both feet before they stop answering his calls and go God knows where to do God knows what, and Adam is so very much over Kris Allen right now, except for the part where he totally isn't.

Thus, what he says is: "Yeah, okay," all casual and probably not fooling anyone.

And then he takes a few deep breaths and tells himself he's not going to do any yelling.

 

" - and so I've been sort of thinking," Kris is saying what might be five hours later but what's probably more like five _minutes_ later, because even if Kris takes a while to really get started, once he's babbling, he's _babbling_ \- a hundred words a minute and ready to try for twice that.

Adam remembers he thought it was cute, once.

" _Sort of_ thinking?" he asks. Kris still hasn't said anything about why he's calling Adam now, or even dropped a hint about whether Adam should be wondering why Kris is calling _him_ now or merely wondering why Kris is calling him _now_.

"Um," Kris says, apparently done with the babbling.

"Um?" Adam echoes. It's been _weeks_ since he's yelled at anyone - months, even.

"I've been thinking," Kris says in a tone that's probably supposed to be all dignified and make it clear to Adam Kris isn't going to be putting up with any of his (entirely justified) annoyance.

"This is new," Adam says, because if he can't yell, at least he can be catty and feel a little better. "Did it make your head hurt?"

"You sound pissed," Kris says. "Why do you sound pissed?"

"You sound surprised," Adam says. He _is_ pissed. After this, maybe he should find an empty studio and do a bit of therapeutic yelling - after having the room swept for bugs, of course. "Why do you sound surprised?"

"Did I call at a bad time?" Kris asks. "I could - "

"A _good_ time would have been oh about three years ago?" Adam says, realizing that yes, it has really been that long and yes, it's probably sort of pathetic to be pining after a guy for _three years_. "But yes, you could hang up now and buy a new cellphone to make sure I can't call you back."

"It _broke_!" Kris protests. "It wasn't my fault! Okay, so I didn't call but ... I didn't think you wanted to talk to me."

Kris doesn't sound like he believes that himself, so Adam decides to be nice and let that one go.

"I want to make a new album," Kris says.

There are some things Adam'd have liked to hear better, such as _'I want to have sex with you'_ but Kris wanting to make music again has definitely been on his wishlist these past three Christmases.

"Great," Adam says. "That's great, Kris." So maybe Kris still doesn't quite love him the way Adam would like him to; Adam's still the first person outside of his family Kris has told about this. Probably. "So you're signed up again?" If Adam's agent knew about this before he did, Adam's going to be a little upset.

"Um," Kris says. "About that."

 

"They're only going to offer him a contract if I take him on as my opening act," Adam says, still not sure if this is really _good_ news, or really _bad_. Both, possibly, given that Kris is involved.

It's like with the _American Idol_ finals; good news: someone cute and nice and perfect with an awesome singing voice won - bad news: it wasn't you.

"You said yes, of course," Allison says. She sounds happy and excited and Adam reminds himself she's got a show of her own tomorrow; he'd be a poor friend if he kept her up too long past her bedtime.

"I said I'd think about it," Adam says.

"You're going to demand sexual favors in exchange?" Allison's twenty-three now, and scarier than she was at the age of seventeen sometimes.

"Not funny," Adam says, even if okay, maybe he's sort of fantasized about it. A little. It's not as if he's _really_ going to do something like that, obviously.

"Well, at least you'd be getting hugs," Allison says. "I worried about that, you know. I mean, without me, who's going to give you a nice hug when you need one?"

"I have a band?"

"Your band's for making out with on stage, not for hugging," Allison says. Adam makes a mental note to go and watch one of her shows as soon as he can - which will probably turn out to be next year or so, given how crammed his schedule is.

His publicist is going to kill him if he beats anyone up, but if it's for Allison, Adam couldn't care less.

On the other hand, _Allison_ might try to kill him, too, or stop speaking to him, and that would sort of suck. Maybe he should bring Kris, let him do the heavy lifting, if any is required. Nobody ever manages to stay mad at Kris for very long - Adam excepted, of course.

"So," he says, "how's _your_ band?"

"Oh, they're great," Allison says. "Hot female lead guitarist. I french her on stage almost every show - not!"

"I love you, too." He does, even when she makes him want to strangle her sometimes, for knowing where his buttons are almost as well as Kris does - or better, perhaps, given that Adam's pretty sure she always hits them on purpose, whereas Kris just seems to kind of stumble over them in really unfortunate ways with the worst possible timing.

"Talk him into doing a duet with you or something."

 

"A ... duet?" Kris asks, making Adam want to reach out and ruffle his hair. "I don't think - "

"You stopped thinking _again_?" There's a lot Adam's going to be putting up with from Kris, he knows. It's only fair he gets in a bit of payback in advance.

The fact that Kris still blushes easily at being teased has got nothing to do with it, honestly.

"Well, what kind of song did you have in mind?" Kris tries to pull off 'practical and reasonable' and fails spectacularly. "I mean, our musical styles aren't exactly alike."

"That song you're thinking of right now sounds good to me," Adam says and okay, it's almost half a guess; he's not _sure_ Kris is thinking of a particular song he and Adam could sing together, but he'd like to think he can still read Kris pretty well, and that look on Kris's face is totally 'name that tune'.

"I'm not thinking of any song in particular," Kris says quickly and almost convincingly, right until he adds: "And anyway, it's just something I wrote for fun."

"You wrote a song for us." _That_ hasn't been on Adam's wishlist for three years in a row, although now that he thinks about it, he rather thinks it should have been.

Kris looks uncomfortable, but nowhere near uncomfortable enough for Adam to seriously consider backing off. He will, if Kris really tells him to, only right now, it's more of a case of the Pocket Idol protesting too much.

"I don't think it's a good idea." Kris doesn't say the _song_ isn't good, Adam notes with interest.

"Why don't you let _me_ worry about that?" A little patronizing, perhaps. On the other hand, _Adam_ 's not the idiot who thought he didn't want to have anything to do with music anymore. "Where is it?"

"I don't think it's a good idea," Kris repeats. "You don't want to sing that sort of song with me."

"Of course I want to sing a lovesong with you," Adam says, because what else could it be? "It will be absolutely fantastic."

 

"Of course you don't want to sing a lovesong with Kris," his agent says.

"I do?" There's a trick to handling his agent, Adam has found, and insisting something is true when she's just told him it's not is not that trick.

" 'Why don't I want to sing a lovesong with Kris?'. 'Why, Adam, I'm so glad you asked. It's because you can't do that whole thing with Tommy anymore if you do.' 'Oh, wow, I hadn't thought of that. How lucky for me I have an agent to think about things like that.'."

"Tommy's getting married?" Adam offers. They've asked him to be best man, even, which is all kinds of cool and if Adam's ever going to get married, he's definitely going to return the favor.

"Do you know how many people come to see your show just for the fanservice?"

It's not that Adam doesn't _know_ he's on stage when he's on stage. It's not really something you can just forget.

On the other hand, it's also not that Adam makes out with Tommy because it's part of the show - even if it is, sort of. He _likes_ Tommy, and Tommy likes a good kisser (and Adam's a _great_ kisser), and Tommy's girlfriend likes Adam, so it's all good.

"I make music, too?" The music's part of the show, and the show's part of the music - at least on stage.

"You kiss Kris on stage and you can have you duet," his agent tells him. "Otherwise, forget it."

 

"Forget it," Kris says, predictably - although there's a small voice in the back of Adam's mind that's pointing out that hey, Kris was happy enough to be hugging him on national television, so what's a little kissing on stage?

Plus, there's this whole thing where Kris wrote a duet-slash-lovesong. "No kissing, no duet - and no duet, no opening act," Adam says. "Sorry."

Kris makes this face like he can't believe Adam really means that - which is true, of course; Adam's not going to sink Kris's career simply because Kris won't put out on stage. Even so, there are other artists Kris could be opening for. It doesn't _have_ to be Adam.

Except that yes, it sort of does. "I'm not going to kiss you in front of a hundreds of people!"

_'So you'd be okay with it if it was just you and me?'_ , Adam doesn't ask.

Kris seems to hear the question anyway. "I'm not going to kiss you, period," he says, which is really kind of pushing it, Adam feels.

"Well, excuse me for being so repulsive!" he snaps.

Kris blinks, like it hasn't really occured to him that maybe he might have hurt Adam's feelings a little there. "I didn't mean it like that." He looks more stubborn than truly apologetic. "You know I didn't mean it like that."

Adam puts on his best 'it's going to take at least a dozen apologies and a bucket of icecrem to fix this' face - never mind that he's pretty much sworn off icecream.

"Oh, come _on_ ," Kris says. "Don't give me that look, Adam."

"Say you're sorry."

Kris rolls his eyes. "I'm sorry you're too insecure to be able to handle the thought of even one person not wanting to kiss you."

"You can hug me now, and all will be forgiven," Adam says - rather generously, if he does say so himself.

"This is ridiculous," Kris says. " _You_ are ridiculous."

"Hug. Now."

 

"You didn't bring up the lovesong." It probably says something about Adam's life that he calls Allison for relationship advice, he thinks. "Why didn't you bring up the lovesong?"

"I haven't even _heard_ the lovesong." Not much of an excuse, and Adam knows it.

The thing is, he shouldn't have to bring up the lovesong. If that song means what Adam thinks it means, he shouldn't have to mention it at all, because then Kris would be _in love_ with him.

Clearly, either the song doesn't mean what Adam thinks it means, or Kris is being an idiot.

"You're not turning into some sort of loser, are you?" Allison asks. "I mean, I know you miss me and all, but we talked about this. You promised."

"I'll bully Kris into handing over the song." He's not quite desperate enough yet to ask Allison to do it for him. Adam devoutly hopes he will _never_ be that desperate.

"Good," Allison says.

"Still plenty of time before the tour starts, anyway." Going by his previous tours, those two months are going to feel more like two weeks, with two years' worth of things to do in them.

"Don't make me come over there."

Adam manages a chuckle. "I miss you, too."

 

Kris forks over the song like a good boy without Adam needing to threaten him ... much.

"I want to put it on my album," he says, looking like he expects Adam to tell him he can't.

"Great idea," Adam replies, glancing over the lyrics. "We can both put it on our next album."

Kris opens his mouth, closes it again ... settles for looking stubborn without having given Adam anything he can be stubborn _about_.

"You know, this sure sounds like a lovesong." More pop-rock than Adam usually goes for, true, but then, he's always told people he doesn't want to be tied down to one style, one kind of music.

"I never said it wasn't a lovesong," Kris says.

"You said you didn't want to kiss me," Adam reminds him. "This song doesn't agree. This song says you're lying awake at night, dreaming about me kissing you."

"It's just a song, Adam," Kris says, and Adam considers for about the hundredth time if he really wants to push this, to push _Kris_. He can be happy being Kris's friend; he's done it before.

"It's _your_ song," he points out. "It's a Kris Allen song."

"No, it's not." Kris shakes his head. "It's a Kris Allen meets Adam Lambert song."

"And it's also a lovesong," Adam says.

"I don't want people to buy my music because I'm the guy kissing Adam Lambert," Kris says.

 

"This is _so_ unfair!" Adam complains or, okay, _whines_ but it's not like Allison can't take a bit of whining, or like Adam's never listened to _her_ whining. Sometimes, it just feels nice to do a bit of whining, especially when life is being a female dog who wants to bite you where it hurts.

"Actually," Allison says, "it kind of makes sense."

"You're not supposed to be on _his_ side!" Adam doesn't need her to tell him it 'kind of makes sense'. He _knows_. In hindsight, maybe he should have guessed Kris would look at it like that.

"At least he still wants to be your opening act?" She's right, of course; Kris being Adam's opening act is already going to have people talking. Kris singing a lovesong with Adam will make things even worse.

"I don't want him to just be my opening act!" Adam wants to say he doesn't see what would be so bad about more people buying Kris's album because Kris is Adam's boyfriend, instead of simply because Kris makes great music. A sold album is a sold album - and anyone who listens to the album just once is going to love it anyway. Who cares why they bought it in the first place?

Kris does, apparently. "You could date him without telling anyone," Allison suggests. "Except me, of course. You're not allowed to date Kris and then not tell me."

"One, I don't think that's going to work." Adam's publicist is great at her job, only Adam knows nobody's _that_ good. "Two, I don't _want_ to date Kris and then not tell anyone."

"You could wait until after the tour?" Allison sounds dubious.

"I waited _three years_." Longer, if you count the time Kris was at least moving in more or less the same circles as Adam, minus the whole glitter and glamor thing. "I'm sick of waiting."

"Well, I guess you could always just seduce him."

 

It's not a _bad_ plan, Adam thinks. It's a _horrible_ plan. It's never going to work, anyway; Kris is one of those guys who are impossible to seduce, because they go along with everything you want them to right until the moment when they don't anymore, and then they don't give you another inch.

"What's with the candles?"

On the other hand, Adam reasons that even a horrible plan is better than no plan at all.

"I thought we could have a romantic dinner," he explains. The scent is supposed to be relaxing, which Adam thinks he might need more than Kris, all things considered.

"Didn't we talk about this?" Kris asks, sitting down all the same and reaching for a slice of pizza.

"If I can choose between having you as my boyfriend or having you as my opening act, I'd rather have you as my boyfriend." It's not true, Adam tells himself. He's just saying it to get to Kris. He _loves_ Kris, and when you love someone, you don't do shitty things like make them choose between their career or you.

"Oh," Kris says softly, looking surprised and maybe a little bit touched before he rallies and adds, at normal volume: "That's pretty selfish of you."

"I'm a selfish person." Kris is the only person Adam's ever met who isn't.

Kris sighs. "If you're not even going to argue, you take all the fun out of it."

"I can be lots of fun," Adam says. "Try me."

"You're an amazing person and I love you," Kris replies and that should have been a wrap, a confession of love to settle things between them once and for all, only it's not and it doesn't.

Adam breathes in and tries to handle this calmly, rationally. "I'm also kind of famous."

"I'd noticed."

Out, and in again. "You can't date me and not expect anyone to notice."

"I could not date you," Kris says, like he means it, like that's really an option.

Adam doesn't think it's an option for _him_. "You're really going to ignore me just because you're afraid of what people might say? That doesn't sound like the Kris Allen I know."

"I'm not going to date you to prove I'm not chicken." Kris grimaces. "I can't believe you'd even try that on me - you should know me better."

Kris does have a point. "I'm getting a little desperate here. And you _love_ me."

"Yes," Kris says. "I do. That's no reason to kiss you on stage, though, or to date you."

"What if - " Adam starts, searching for something, anything, to tack on to that opening.

"If you loved me back, it might be different," Kris says.

 

"I now pronounce you loser and bigger loser," Allison declares, and Adam would be objecting that he's _not_ a loser - it's just that Kris is an _idiot_ \- except that Kris is right there and Adam'd sort of like to not sleep on his (admittedly very comfortable) couch tonight, so instead he just kind of smiles.

"Who is which?" Kris asks, completely proving Adam's point.

"That depends on who gives me a hug first." Allison bats her eyelashes. It doesn't look any less disturbing than it did the first time Adam saw her do it - the gesture hasn't got the slightest effect on _him_ , of course, but one of these days, she's going to be batting her eyelashes at some straight guy who isn't going to be worthy of her in a million years and then Adam's going to be screwed.

Of course, he's got Kris to support him now. And also to hug Allison while Adam's busy worrying.

"You're a loser, Kris." Allison beams. Kris looks smug, like he's got anything to be proud of here.

"My hugs are better," Adam says.

"Your hugs are _the best_ ," Allison agrees easily enough. "I can see why you picked him," she tells Kris.

" _I_ was the one picking _him_ ," Adam protests. "I'm famous! I coud be dating _anyone_."

"You can hit him, you know," Allison says, while Kris is rolling his eyes. "With a pillow or something. It doesn't really shut him up, but it might make you feel better."

"I can shut him up any time I want," Kris assures her with a grin.

Allison looks at Adam. Adam tries to look innocent.

"You," she says to Kris, "are _not_ a loser. And you - " turning to Adam " - are a lucky man."

"I know," Adam says.


End file.
